Stars in a Time Warp

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About Me

I've owned my quilt shop since 1990, specializing in antique reproduction fabrics. Made my first quilt in 1976 which greatly reduced my sewing of clothing! Would like to find more time to SEW.......maybe when I retire? Am married to a farmer, have 3 children and 4 grandchildren who are the light of my life!!!

Monday, November 26, 2012

As scraps collect from the ends of bolts, mistaken cuts, etc, I throw them into a Medium Flat Rate USPS box and it is now Full!! Can hardly close it and it weighs over 6 lbs! There are more than 120 different Reproduction prints and a few homespuns. Most fabrics are less than 6" but are WOF strips. Great for log cabins and other strip quilt patterns!! And I have already started on the next box of scraps! Will let you know when it is ready to give away!

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My feet seem to show up in a lot of my photos! I stand on a chair on take the photos on the dining room table. The little Log Cabin Tablemat below is a recent Finish! Original pattern from Prairie Women's Sewing Circle had 16 blocks, but I decided four was enough for what I needed!

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Today was to be a Sew Day but by the time I finished "chores" (boring work that needs to be done!), it was after Noon! Then, I could not settle down to just one thing, flitted back and forth from project to project.....and, cutting out some new blocks for a little quilt using Edyta Sitar's "Dancing in the Rain"....you guessed it.....more triangles....which will become Pinwheels.

Finally, made a decision after spending way too much time trying to choose sashing/border for this little Flying Geese from Jo Morton Club 11.....Geese are 5/8" x 1-1/8. I stayed with my usual "safe" colors instead of using the new, brighter colors from Jo's New Leesburg line.

Here is yet another Triangle Quilt! From Carol Hopkins' Civil War Legacies patterns, "Stars to Freedom". When the Friendship Collection for a Cause line came in, I knew I had found the blue I wanted to use for this quilt. (Border, tho, is from Terry Thompson's "Louisa" line). Could have used the lovely Friendship Turkey reds too, but didn't want the same prints used twice..........definitely not hard to find Reds......love them!

Closeup of the lower triangle block. I just let the colors fall where they may! No planning here! Well, except for counting to have a nearly equal mix!

Not sure if I have showed this quilt before and too lazy to go looking to see if I have..........really need to make myself an Index.......someday! This quilt was an exercise to show customers how far a 6" Charm package could go. Cut each charm into four 3" squares, match up with tea-dye muslin squares and Make Triangles! Judie Rothermel's brown/blue (contained 20 fabrics if I recall correctly) Charleston 3 is the fabric line used.....the 4 other Charleston lines were brown/pink. This quilt is 28" x 40".

This photo shows a few antique Tumbler blocks, sewn together in one long row....there are 153 of them dating from the late Nineteenth Century. This must have been a common way to sew them "back in the day" and then just "unsew" where needed when it was time to make rows of a quilt. Last week at Quilt Study, a friend showed a box of "stuff" she recently acquired that contained Triangles sewn together in the same manner......except that there were Lots More single Triangles cut and ready to go............oh why didn't I think to take a photo of hers?

Friday, November 16, 2012

Am having a dilemma about these paper-pieced Flying Geese....can't decide the setting/border fabrics. These two look too bright to me tho I really like the fabrics! Can't use brown as I used that for the first FG quilt (Jo Morton club pattern). Maybe I should go take a look at blue again. Black would probably look nice for the contrast but I don't care for black in my little quilts.....oh what to do? I want to finish and get on with others! Ideas welcome!

This is a little eye candy of recently-arrived fabrics. First two photos are the huge line of "Metropolitan Fair" by Barbara Brackman (1840-1870)....love that it comes in 7 colorways.....(green, red/pink,dark brown, grey blue, tan, and blue......sorry, missed the tan and blue!)

This is "Toasted" by Jo Morton.......luscious backgrounds!

Representing the "Warmth" collection (Collection for a Cause from Moda) is this little wallhanging I made from a pattern handout that is free with any charm square purchase.....simple little quilt.......based on similar theory as "Yellow Brick Road" or "Turning Twenty" in that there is a formula for cutting the 5" charm squares similar to the formulas for cutting fat quarters in YBR and TT. When I laid out the blocks, intending to mix them up more and/or twist them, I found that I liked the arrangement of all blocks in the same position....so I left them that way!

These bolts are from the luscious "Dancing in the Rain" by Edyta Sitar.....love her print fabrics!

From 3 Sisters by Moda, this is "Double Chocolate".....didn't get enough of it the first time around so more have been printed!!

Thursday, November 8, 2012

Sure feels good to have some Finishes once in a while! Like everyone else, I have way too many WIPs, but it is hard not to start something new. I often think I can "finish this in no time" but it soon becomes a WIP as I find yet another project that I want to start........... One reason I attribute my "Finishes" to is that I have become rather addicted to audiobooks! The cd player is in my sewing room so I spend more time than usual here as I am eager to hear more! Just finished "Atlas Shrugged" (50 discs!) and before that "George Washington" (30 discs), and now I am listening to "Anna Karenina" which is also 30 discs........I like the Unabridged versions....don't want to feel like I am missing anything!

I joined the worldwide craze of making little 3" paper-pieced houses....goal was to make one a day for 365 and this is how far I have gotten! I really like making these scrappy little houses but they are not FAST....at least not for me! I may make some hand-piecing templates for pickup work, but what I Really Should do for that is to get back to making Jane Stickle Civil War blocks! And, little 3" Posey Packet blocks from Froncie Quinn's reproduction of a Florence Peto quilt! Both projects are neatly packed in their little boxes waiting for me! I like "containers".......my Jane blocks are in a tortoiseshell plastic box in which my father got cigars in the 1950's......on the top is written "For My Sewing" with various sewing implements pictured. The little 3" Florence Peto ninepatches with alternating applique blocks by Froncie are in a little lunchbox sold by Moda a few years ago. I'll take photos so you will see what I am talking about.......you know how a picture is worth a thousand words!

This is a little (about 9" x 16") runner I made to demonstrate to customers that you can create your own projects without patterns.....just make blocks (mine are 3" Shoofly, but make whatever block you like in whatever size you need!), put together with sashing (or not!), add a border (or two!) and bind! I made this for the shop to show off 3 brown/pink fabrics from the "Addison" line by Nancy Gere for Windham. The green sashing is by Jo Morton....was at a loss for a fourth fabric so decided to go completely different! Have always loved brown and green together! Actually like brown/pink, brown/blue and brown/red too!!!

After about two years of working on this Applecore Tablerunner, it is finished! Completely finished! I absolutely love it! There are 7 rows of 21 applecores.....147 total.....all Moda except for two. Made from Cindy Blackberg's rubber stamp, I hand-pieced the top, hand-quilted inside each little applecore and then hand-basted the bias binding. Went back and machine stitched the binding on and finished by hand on the back.

Closeup of the quilting......I didn't mark any quilting lines, preferring to just "eyeball" the 1/4" and it is sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less, but I don't care. I am such a slow quilter that I need to skip any steps I can!

This was just a little fun project I did when I needed coasters for my coffee/tea mug.....tired of using a napkin or paper towel! I did make a log cabin block a while back to use as a coaster, but could not bear for it to get dirty with use so I handquilted it and it is now a Christmas tree ornament! As you know from previous posts, I love Cheater fabrics and this one (I think the line was called Acorn from Moda a couple years ago) seemed to be just the right size for small coasters (about 3-1/2"). Because there is no separate binding, they go together quickly!

Well. it seems the photo of the Coasters did not come through! Could have sworn it was there last evening! Back later!

Here is the photo promised of the finished little coasters for my coffee mug....quick as a wink to make and most useful too!

Will leave you with one of my new fabric deliveries, "Warmth", the new Collection for a Cause from Moda! Took photos of what came in this week but the camera I used wasn't cooperating so will retake those ("Toasted" by Jo Morton, "Dancing in the Rain" by Edyta Sitar, "Double Chocolate" by 3 Sisters, and "Metropolitan Fair" by Barbara Brackman) tomorrow with a different camera!